UNCLOS

1. • The central purposes of the international law of the sea are to define various maritime zones, their extension
and limits. According to the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea the continental shelf of
coastal states extends at least to a distance of 200 nm from the baselines from which the breadth of the
territorial sea is measured (Article 76(1) of UNCLOS).
• UNCLOS provides that information on the limits of the continental shelf beyond 200 nm from the baselines
shall be submitted by the coastal state to a scientific and technical Commission, named the Commission on
the Limits of the Continental Shelf. The Commission is responsible for making recommendations to coastal
states on matters related to the establishment of the outer limits of their continental shelf beyond 200 nm.
• According to UNCLOS, it is the task for adjacent and opposite neighboring states to delimit the maritime
boundaries of their continental shelves. The delimitation is supposed to be effected by an agreement and if not
possible within a reasonable time resort shall be made to procedures provided for in the dispute settlement
part of UNCLOS. The Convention provides that this process shall be guided by the whole range of
international law as defined in Article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice. The most
important outcome of this guidance is that it designates a law making role for international Courts and
Tribunals. The purpose of continental shelf delimitation is to achieve an equitable solution, not to fulfill a
specific technical criterion as in the CLCS procedure.

2. Means and methods of resolving maritime boundary disputes:
Article 33 of the UN Charter provides for the peaceful settlement of
disputes by means of the parties’ own choice. These means always
include negotiation. If negotiations are not successful, recourse may be
had to conciliation, good offices (e.g. of the UN Secretary General),
arbitration (ad hoc or according to annex VII UNCLOS or judicial
settlement (ICJ/ITLOS)).
Methods of settling differences and disputes about overlapping
entitlements include resolving any sovereignty differences, the
establishment of a complete boundary, a partial boundary or a joint
area, or combining some of those methods. Maritime boundaries are to
be established by agreement in accordance with international law.
Disputes and differences about sovereignty will be resolved by
examining which State has more activity on the disputed territory.

3. The value of establishing maritime boundaries:
The potential political and security risks of boundary disputes are high. In this
respect the speaker quoted Lord Curzon's: "frontiers are the razor's edge on
which hang suspended…issues of war and peace…"
Unresolved boundaries may chill economic activity, such as exploration work
or fishing, because of fear of action by the other State. Besides that, they may
also in advertently cause disputes, if a fisherman is arrested for fishing in a
border area or if an oil discovery is made in an area of overlapping claims, for
instance.
Conversely, reaching agreement on a boundary brings positive benefits. Legal
certainty means that economic activity can start. The oil industry can be
licensed to work right up to the line. The enforcement of fisheries legislation is
also possible right up to the line. A maritime boundary removes the “blight”
caused by jurisdictional uncertainty.

4. CHINA:
In accordance with the decision of the Standing Committee of the Eighth National People's Congress of the
People's Republic of China at its nineteenth session, the President of the People's Republic of China has
hereby ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 and at the
same time made the following statement:
1. In accordance with the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the People's
Republic of China shall enjoy sovereign rights and jurisdiction over an exclusive economic zone of 200
nautical miles and the continental shelf.
2. The People's Republic of China will effect, through consultations, the delimitation of the boundary of
the maritime jurisdiction with the States with coasts opposite or adjacent to China respectively on the basis
of international law and in accordance with the principle of equitability.
3. The People's Republic of China reaffirms its sovereignty over all its archipelagos and islands as listed in
article 2 of the Law of the People's Republic of China on the territorial sea and the contiguous zone, which
was promulgated on 25 February 1992.
4. The People's Republic of China reaffirms that the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the
Law of the Sea concerning innocent passage through the territorial sea shall not prejudice the right of a
coastal State to request, in accordance with its laws and regulations, a foreign State to obtain advance
approval from or give prior notification to the coastal State for the passage of its warships through the
territorial sea of the coastal State.
Declaration made after ratification (25 August 2006)
Declaration under article 298:The Government of the People's Republic of China does not accept any of
the procedures provided for in Section 2 of Part XV of the Convention with respect to all the categories of
disputes referred to in paragraph 1 (a) (b) and (c) of Article 298 of the Convention.

5. ICELAND:
Declaration made upon ratification (21 June 1985): Upon depositing
the instrument of ratification of the United Nations Convention on the
Law of the Sea, the Permanent Representative of Iceland, on behalf of
the Government of Iceland, declares that under article 298 of the
Convention the right is reserved that any interpretation of article 83
shall be submitted to conciliation under Annex V, section 2, of the
Convention.
The normal baseline is the low water line, that certain bays may be
closed that straight baselines, recognised in the case of UK v. Norway
and included in the 1958 Geneva Convention on the Territorial Sea and
the 1982 UNCLOS, could be drawn around deeply indented coastlines
or fringes of islands. According to the speaker a lot of States - with the
exception of the US - have drawn straight baselines, sometimes in a
very liberal way. The ICJ has adopted a rather strict interpretation in
boundary cases but without making any finding that a particular
straight baseline has been drawn in violation of UNCLOS. There are no
cases dealing with baselines specifically, later than UK v. Norway.

6. CANADA: As of July 2001, Canada has not filed an official claim to an extended continental shelf with
the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. Canada has through 2013 to file such a claim.
DENMARK: Denmark ratified the extended continental shelf claim to UNCLOS on November 16, 2004.
The Kingdom of Denmark declared that the Danish straits including the Great Belt, the Little Belt, and the
Danish part of the Sound, formed on the foundation of the Copenhagen Treaty of 1857 are a legal part of
the Danish regime. As set out in the treaty section of the United Nations Office of Legal Affairs, it should
remain so.
The Danish autonomous province of Greenland has the nearest coastline to the North Pole, and Denmark
argues that the Lomonosov Ridge is in fact an extension of Greenland. Danish project included LORITA-
1 expedition in April–May 2006 and included tectonic research during LOMROG expedition, which were
part of the 2007-2008 International Polar Year program. It comprised the Swedishicebreaker Oden and
Russian nuclear icebreaker NS 50 Let Pobedy. The latter led the expedition through the ice fields to the
research location. Further efforts at geological study in the region were carried out by the LOMROG II
expedition, which took place in 2009, and the LOMROG III expedition, launched in 2012.
NORWAY: Norway ratified the UNCLOS in late 1996 and on November 27, 2006, Norway made an
official submission into the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in accordance with the
United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (article 76, paragraph 8). There are provided arguments
to extend the Norwegian seabed claim beyond the 200 nmi (370 km; 230 mi) EEZ in three areas of the
northeastern Atlantic and the Arctic: the "Loop Hole" in the Barents Sea, the Western Nansen Basin in the
Arctic Ocean, and the "Banana Hole" in the Norwegian Sea. The submission also states that an additional
submission for continental shelf limits in other areas may be posted later.

7. RUSSIA: Russia ratified the UNCLOS in 1997 and had until 2007 to make its claim to an extended continental
shelf.
Russia is claiming a large extended continental shelf as far as the North Pole based on the Lomonosov
Ridge within their Arctic sector. Moscow believes the eastern Lomonosov Ridge is an extension of
the Siberian continental shelf. The Russian claim does not cross the Russia-US Arctic sector demarcation line, nor
does it extend into the Arctic sector of any other Arctic coastal state.
On December 20, 2001, Russia made an official submission into the UN Commission on the Limits of the
Continental Shelf in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (article 76, paragraph
8). In the document it is proposed to establish the outer limits of the continental shelf of Russia beyond the 200-
nautical-mile (370 km) Exclusive Economic Zone, but within the Russian Arctic sector. The territory claimed by
Russia in the submission is a large portion of the Arctic within its sector, extending to but not beyond the
geographic North Pole. One of the arguments was a statement that Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain
ridge passing near the Pole, and Mendeleev Ridge on the Russian side of the Pole is extensions of the Eurasian
continent. In 2002 the UN Commission neither rejected nor accepted the Russian proposal, recommending
additional research.
USA: As of March 2012, the United States had not ratified the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and,
therefore, had not filed an official claim to an extended continental shelf with the UN Commission on the Limits of
the Continental Shelf.
In August 2007, an American Coast Guard icebreaker, the USCGC Healy, headed to the Arctic Ocean to map the
sea floor off Alaska. Larry Mayer, director of the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping at the University of New
Hampshire, stated the trip had been planned for months, having nothing to do with the Russians planting their flag.
The purpose of the mapping work aboard the Healy is to determine the extent of the continental shelf north of
Alaska.

8. RESULTS:
Iceland vs. United Kingdom (Fisheries Jurisdiction): The Court ordered for further negotiations covered by
the 1973 interim agreement.
Continental Shelf and Fisheries Boundaries in the Arctic Region:
Canada-Denmark: continental shelf agreed (December 17, 1973)
Denmark-Iceland: continental shelf and fisheries boundary agreed (November 11, 1997)
Denmark-Norway: continental shelf and fisheries boundary agreed (December 18, 1995) following
adjudication by ICJ
Denmark-Iceland-Norway: tri-point agreed (November 11, 1997)
Denmark-Norway: continental shelf and fisheries boundary agreed (February 20, 2006)
Iceland-Norway: fisheries boundary following the 200 mm limit of Iceland’s EEZ agreed (May 28, 1980);
continental shelf joint zone agreed following the report of the Conciliation Commission (October 22,
1981)
Russia-US: single maritime boundary agreed (June 1 1990)

9. Fisheries Boundaries (EEZ) in the Northeast Asia:
Korea-Japan Fisheries Agreement of 1999
The Agreement of 1999 is agreed not upon the ultimate EEZ boundaries but upon the provisional joint
fishing zones and EEZ fisheries zones of a limited extent which are to be considered as each Party’s EEZ
for the purpose of implementation of the Agreement. As such, there is no doubt that the Agreement is a
provisional arrangement of a practical nature envisaged in Paragraph 3 of Article 74 of the LOS
Convention pending the ultimate agreement on boundaries of EEZ. Thus the Agreement purports to
regulate fisheries relations between Korea and Japan pending the ultimate delimitation of EEZ boundaries
between the two countries. Related to this, the Agreement obliges the two countries “to continue to
negotiate in good faith for an earlier delimitation of the exclusive economic zone”.
Korean-Chinese Fisheries Agreement
The Fisheries Agreement between Korea and China shares some of the fundamental aspects with the
Fisheries Agreement between Korea and Japan: it is a fisheries agreement based upon the EEZ fisheries
regime of the LOS Convention and it is a provisional fisheries agreement pending the ultimate delimitation
of EEZ boundaries. As it is a fisheries agreement based upon the EEZ regime of Korea and China, Article
1 of the Agreement makes it clear that the Agreement applies to Korea’s EEZ and China’s EEZ. And then
Article 2 of the Agreement provided that: “Each Contracting Party shall permit, in accordance with the
provisions of this Agreement and its relevant laws and regulations, the fishing activities by the nationals
and fishing vessels of the other Party in its exclusive economic zone”. And then detailed provisions on
mutual fishing access follow in Articles 2 to 5 of theAgreement.

10. Sino-Japanese Fisheries Agreement of 1997
The new fisheries agreement between China and Japan is a provisional fisheries agreement for regulating
fisheries relations between them on the basis of an EEZ fisheries regime pending the ultimate delimitation
of EEZ ultimate boundaries between China and Japan. Thus the two Governments expressed ‘their
intentions to continue the consultations on the delimitation of the exclusive economic zones and the
continental shelves of both countries’, and ‘to make efforts so that a mutually acceptable agreement is
reached’. Both Parties agreed that: “Nothing in this Agreement shall be deemed to prejudice the position
of either Contracting Party in regard to any question on the law of the sea”. Also more specifically, both
Parties confirmed in the Agreed Minute that the Provisional Measure Zone ‘should not be deemed to
prejudice the position of either Contracting Party in regard to the delimitation of the exclusive economic
zones and the continental shelves’.
Conclusion
The researchers had concluded that through UNCLOS’ declaration and statement, in relation to territorial
disputes in the sea, it has resolved such events which could affect the relations of the involved parties. The
EEZ in Northeast Asia, the Fisheries Jurisdiction between UK and Iceland, and the Arctic Region maritime
jurisdiction were issues that UNCLOS can be used of, in terms of relating it to UNCLOS’ declarations and
statements. The researchers had examined that upon ratifying the UNCLOS’ regulations, each parties has
the right to claim such boundaries unless they had grasped the rules of UNCLOS. The researchers had also
concluded that negotiations should be made in accordance to the UN’s recommendation as part of the
resolution process. So, each and one of them should really work together so that there would be no
imminent conflicts among them.

11. Recommendation
The researchers recommend the strong enforcement of the laws of
UNCLOS because even though parties have had agreements, still, the
involved parties (China, Japan, and Korea) have not followed what
they had agreed upon. Recognition of boundaries and fishing zone
should also be taken in action by the UN, with the assistance of
UNCLOS. UN should consider the possibility of a tension among
opposing nations, like what is happening between Philippines and
China, because it could endanger the safety of individuals and it would
affect the relationships of both parties. The UNCLOS is already
effective in terms of its laws and regulations but the execution of its
laws and regulations is very weak, especially on exercising it. And so,
UNCLOS should be as firm as it is when agreements are being made
and supervising it is really a necessity because there is no assurance
that involved parties are actually following it. UNCLOS needs more
back-up and power.